Perfect Cell VS Super-Skrull (Dragon Ball VS Marvel Comics)

 

(Spider-Pidge)


(Phantom Falcon)


Cell, the bio-android harbinger of the Red Ribbon Army’s revenge.


Kl’rt, the shapeshifting champion of the Skrull Empire.


They say that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery that mediocrity can pay to greatness, but for these copycat warriors gifted cosmic powers for the sake of retribution, they've easily lived up to the sum of their parts. With the stage set for another world's fate hinging on intergalactic combat, will Kl'rt prove himself the perfect champion of his people, or will Cell bring annihilation upon him and his homeworld? All will be revealed in another exhilarating duel within the Cell G-...er, DEATH BATTLE!


Cell

In case you were wondering…

  • The following analysis is primarily focused on Perfect Cell as he was portrayed within the canonical Dragon Ball timeline, which means his appearances in the original Dragon Ball manga and anything applicable from the Dragon Ball Super anime (Which, for the record, is basically just its version of the Planet Vegeta bust). Other media such as feats and abilities from the games and his Toei counterpart will be used as supporting evidence, though the manga will still be the focus and anything outside of it will be denoted as such.

  • While Cell Max was created based on the original Cell’s design, it ultimately isn’t the same character as the one who fought during the Cell Saga, and thus it will not be considered for this analysis.

  • Just as a head’s up, the scans for the Dragon Ball manga used for the analysis used the Dragon Ball Z renumbering rather than the overall chapters, so “Chapter 1” of DBZ is equivalent to Chapter 195 of Dragon Ball, etc.

Background

  • Height: Varies, 7’0” as Perfect Cell

  • Affiliation: Red Ribbon Army

  • Likes: Perfection, fighting strong opponents, bringing fear to the faces of humanity, Tien in pain

  • First Appearance: Dragon Ball Chapter 360 - Kami-sama and the Demon King Become One (1992)

  • Made up of Saiyan, Namekian, and Frost Demon cells

  • His yell is iconic among the FGC


Years after the destruction of the Red Ribbon Army at the hands of the young Son Goku, Dr. Gero, its lead scientist and one of its founding members, worked away in the background to formulate his revenge. This revenge would find outlets in several different forms, from building full-on androids to transforming humans into cyborg warriors, but his greatest creation would bide its time as the others made their move. Down within the basement of the doctor’s lab lay a bio-android, gifted with the cells and eventually techniques of the strongest alien warriors the Earth had known, which would spend decades growing and evolving in secret. Within that time, two of Gero’s other projects had already broken free, killing their “creator” and bringing an apocalypse to the future world, leaving the bio-android to be grown by Gero’s computer in his absence. The computer gave the creature its ultimate mission, to absorb the escaped cyborgs and reach its ultimate state, achieving perfection.


After years of growth, the creature that would become known as Cell awoke within the destroyed remains of the future, but with its ultimate goal out of reach. By the time it awoke, a young half-Saiyan named Trunks had traveled to the past to change the course of history, and returned to his present to destroy the Androids who had spent so long bringing terror to the world. After overpowering and killing the future swordsman for taking his chance of perfection, the bio-android stole his time machine and traveled to the past that he had altered, hoping to find the Androids alive within that time period. After arriving in the past, and waiting three years due to his larval state needing to access the time machine, Cell had awoken and began its quest to achieve perfection, absorbing entire cities worth of people to gain their energy as he planned to take on the Androids.


After being found by the newly fused Piccolo, and his presence being made aware of by the Z-Fighters, the bio-android escaped with one of his many copied abilities and continued to seek more energy to overpower the Androids. After making his way through more cities and narrowly avoiding the Z-Fighters by hiding his ki signature, Cell wounds up with the energy of over a hundred thousand people before he made his move, interrupting a battle between Cell and Android 17 in the process. The bio-android’s newfound strength led to him easily overwhelming Piccolo and absorbing 17, reaching his Semi-Perfect form. With this newfound power, he attempted to absorb Android 18 immediately and reach his pinnacle, only to find himself up against Vegeta and a different timeline’s Trunks, both of whom had trained within the Room of Spirit of Time specifically for such an encounter. This training gave Vegeta more than enough power to annihilate Cell, and realizing this, the bio-android played to the Saiyan’s pride, promising that he’d have the power to more than defeat the prince had he absorbed Android 18. And in spite of Trunks’ attempts to stop him, Vegeta let Cell go, giving the bio-android the chance to absorb 18 and reach his ultimate state, Perfect Cell.


With his newfound power, Cell kept his word and stomped the Saiyan prince into the ground, before blitzing the half-Saiyan from the future to show his newfound powers weren’t all they’d hoped to be. Ironically mirroring Vegeta from just prior, after learning that Trunks and co. had the potential to get stronger if Cell were to let them live, the bio-android allowed them that time; 10 days to train for the newly decided upon Cell Games, where the strongest of Earth’s fighters step up to face Cell, with humanity’s safety ensured if they win, but the methodical slaughter of the human race if they lost. 10 days came and went, and after a brief interruption by a world champion in way over his head, Cell at last finally had a fight with the person he was made to kill, Son Goku.


The following battle pushed both the Super Saiyan and bio-android to their physical and tactical limits, constantly one-upping the other with their strategies and taking each moment to keep pushing an advantage. Ultimately though, Goku’s stamina wasn’t able to match up to Cell’s, and a prolonged fight would naturally lead to the Saiyan’s death. So instead Goku gave up, throwing in the towel and leaving the fight to the actual strongest Z-Fighter left: His son, Gohan. After being given a Senzu Bean to fight at full strength, and becoming disappointed by the boy’s lack of killer instinct, Cell created offspring to overwhelm the Z-Fighters and force Gohan to reach that level of rage. But it wasn’t until he destroyed Android 16, who had told the boy that letting go and letting that anger take hold was sometimes needed for peace, that the power finally awakened in the half-Saiyan. Gohan’s power ascended beyond that of a Super Saiyan, and as he destroyed the Cell Juniors and faced down the bio-android, Cell finally found the final challenge he had been looking for.


Said final challenge, however, was a hopeless endeavor for the bio-android, with Gohan consistently and casually overpowering him at every turn, and forcing him to push his body past where he was even maneuverable, a failing he mocked Trunks for days prior. With one more hit, the half-Saiyan struck Cell hard enough to eject Android 18 from his body, returning him to his Semi-Perfect state with no chance of victory. Seeing this, the bio-android started a self-destruct sequence that would annihilate the planet, which at the very least would bring his foes to an end along with him, until Goku teleported in at the last moment. With mere moments to spare, the Saiyan teleported Cell to another planet, where he at last detonated, killing the Saiyan and ending Cell’s reign of terror.


…Until he teleported back a moment later, fatally wounding Trunks as he made his return. While the explosion had ended Goku’s life, Cell’s own regeneration let him survive, and his Saiyan physiology allowed him to not only return as his Perfect self, but an even stronger form than what Gohan had faced prior. After crippling the half-Saiyan’s arm, the bio-Android charged up one last beam of energy, one with the power to annihilate the Z-Fighters, the planet, and the entire solar system itself. In response, Son Gohan, feeling his late father’s spirit pushing him to give everything he had, charged a Kamehameha of his own in response, as both warriors threw everything they had at each other at full power. For a few moments, Cell had taken the upper-hand, gaining an edge in one final beam clash for the fate of the world, all until taking one last energy blast from Vegeta in retaliation for murdering his son. That single attack lost Cell his concentration, giving Gohan the opportunity he needed to break through the clash and hit Cell with everything he had, annihilating him so completely that he could never regenerate from it. In the end, Cell got what he wanted most: an opponent powerful enough to give him the best, and very last, fight of his life.

Experience and Skill

Despite technically being 6 years old, Cell has the combined…cells, of some of the most well experienced and talented fighters across the cosmos, and it shows in several of his fights. With Goku’s DNA, Cell is capable of keeping up and even overwhelming martial artists in pure hand to hand, some of whom have trained since birth, including Goku himself. With Piccolo’s DNA, he’s inherited his great cunning, coming up with tactical maneuvers to gain an upper hand in battle


Along with his natural combat skill, Cell has shown that he’s able to use his own physiology to his advantage when it comes to outlasting his opponents. Because of his incredibly potent regeneration and the boosts in power that come from near death experiences, Cell can not only keep up an offensive long enough for his opponent’s stamina to give way, he’s also capable of either closing a power gap or turning it well into his favor the more he winds up being damaged.

Forms

Imperfect Cell

Cell’s original combative form after maturing from his larval stage. While the weakest of his main forms due to the lack of androids absorbed, he’s still strong enough to have killed the same Future Trunks who easily defeated Freeza and King Cold, and while not a match for him initially, could eventually heavily overpower fused Piccolo after absorbing enough people.

Semi-Perfect Cell

The midway point in Cell’s evolution after absorbing Android 17. While a big step up in power from his Imperfect self, being able to one-shot Android 16 after he previously gave Imperfect Cell trouble, he was still heavily outclassed by the likes of Super Saiyan Vegeta. While outmatched physically, he still showcased the ability to play into Vegeta’s own pride and desire to fight stronger opponents, getting him to spare him long enough to successfully reach his Perfect form.

Perfect Cell

Cell’s ultimate form after absorbing both 17 and 18. While naturally being far stronger than his previous form, being able to completely dominate Super Vegeta and keep up a winning fight against Goku even after the latter’s trip to the time chamber, Cell’s prowess in battle was arguably boosted just as much. Perfect Cell is the form that expresses his skill in combat the most, particularly in how he employs his own strategies while also recognizing the faults in others’, matching Goku’s lifetime of fighting skill and changing strategies on the fly just as much as he matches and surpasses him in raw strength.

Super Saiyan Third Grade

An enhanced version of a Super Saiyan transformation which greatly enhances power while drastically cutting speed to accommodate it. Cell initially only used the form purely to show Trunks that reaching it wasn’t impressive, and that its drawbacks far outweighed any reason to use it. However, in desperation against Gohan, Cell would attempt to genuinely use the form, just for its drawbacks to hinder him just as he himself described.

Super Perfect Cell

After miraculously surviving his own self-destruct, the boost in power from the Zenkai not only returned him to his Perfect form in spite of lacking either Android, but also massively boosted his strength to the point that he matched Super Saiyan 2 Gohan in power in spite of being significantly outmatched mere moments prior.

Abilities

Ki Manipulation

As with most major players in the Dragon Ball universe, Cell is able to manipulate his life energy for various different abilities or benefits. He’s able to amplify his Ki to reach greater power, fire bursts of Ki as projectiles, create an aura around him that grants higher defenses, fly, sense other beings’ Ki signatures, lower his own to avoid similar detection, and more. Most notably, he’s able to channel it into several different techniques, many of which he’s copied from other fighters.

Absorption

With his tail, Cell is able to absorb other people to increase his power. While the main benefits from this were to reach his higher forms through 17 and 18, absorbing even ordinary people gave a boost on their own. For instance, after doing so to hundreds of thousands of people, Imperfect Cell went from being on the back foot against Piccolo to completely dominating their next encounter. While non-canonical, other material has showcased that Cell can gain significant power boosts by absorbing opponents with high power levels, such as feeling a sizable increase after temporarily absorbing Goku in GT. However, he can’t absorb anyone purely mechanical, as he tried and failed to do so to Android 16.


It’s also fucking disgusting and googling it for images was a mistake.

Telekinesis

Cell is able to telekinetically control and move objects without directly interacting with them, such as carving up a mountain to create the arena for the Cell Games. While he personally hasn’t used it offensively in canon, media such as Dragon Ball FighterZ has shown him using it in combat, and he should be able to use it to the extent Freeza did against Goku.

Regeneration

Thanks to copying Piccolo’s DNA, Cell is able to regenerate his body from major injuries, shrugging off missing limbs within moments of taking damage that would’ve crippled or killed most others. Specifically, a cluster of cells in his body make up a “core”, and so long as they remain intact, he can survive from even microscopic remains. Because of this, unless this core is destroyed (Either through specific targeting or simply destroying every single cell that make up his body), Cell can get back up even stronger due to the Zenkai Boosts said injuries grant him.


In spite of explicitly stating later that the core was within his head, Cell had previously had his head destroyed by Goku’s Instant Transmission Kamehameha and gotten up just fine. According to Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot, Cell was outright lying about it initially and wouldn’t disclose its actual location.

Kamehameha

Originally developed by Master Roshi, the Kamehameha would become known as Goku’s signature technique, and thus passed from him to Cell as the first ability he’s been shown to replicate. After charging energy between both of his hands, Cell can fire off a powerful energy wave to deal large, continuous damage to his foes. These beams can be used to clash with and overpower his opponents’ own Ki attacks, and have been used by Goku for traversal faster than his own flight could propel him.

Solar Flare

A technique stolen from Tien. By placing his hands to his head and calling out the attack’s name, Cell can blind all foes around him in order to either make an escape or gain an advantage by attacking the blinded foe. In combination with his ability to hide his Ki, can make effective getaways with it if he needs to.

Perfect Barrier

An enhanced version of Android 17’s Barrier, which Cell inherited after absorbing 17 and acquiring his infinite energy generator. Cell generates a large energy barrier around him, primarily to block incoming attacks, but can also be used offensively to destroy his surroundings and attack any nearby opponents.

Death Beam

Copied from Freeza, this technique fires a concentrated beam of energy from Cell’s finger towards a target. Can be used rapid-fire, or Cell can put more energy into it to use the Full Power Death Beam, which is stronger and better at fatally piercing the opponent.


It’s also very good at killing Vegeta and his kin.

Cell Juniors

“Children” of Cell that he’s able to create to fight in his stead, each with similar abilities to their creator. Seven were created to fight against the Z-Fighters to force Gohan to power up, and were strong enough to match the likes of Super Saiyan Vegeta and Trunks.

Self-Destruct

As a last resort option, Cell greatly increases in mass as he’s charged with enough energy to detonate, wiping out the planet he’s on one minute after initiating, or sooner if he’s struck while in this form. This technique is ultimately the one that led to him killing Goku, and while he didn’t seem to intend for it, he was able to regenerate from it and use the subsequent Zenkai to his own benefit.

Instant Transmission

After recovering from the aforementioned Self-Destruct, Cell inherited the late Goku’s Instant Transmission technique, which allows one to instantaneously teleport to another Ki signature from long distances. Cell used it to transport himself from the remains of King Kai’s Planet back to Earth, traveling from Other World back to his home planet within moments of learning the technique.

Other Copied Abilities

While the above are all techniques we know Cell to be capable of in the manga, given how he naturally gained those abilities through simply having the cells of those who learned them, it’s reasonable to suggest that he should be capable of other abilities those fighters had. He’s said he can probably pull off the Spirit Bomb if he attempted to, and other media have shown both it and several other abilities he has the potential to utilize:

  • Afterimage Strike: Cell leaves an afterimage of himself to distract his opponent, which leaves an opening for the real Cell to attack.

  • Big Bang Attack: One of Vegeta’s signature techniques. Cell charges a small ball of energy within his hand, then fires it, detonating on contact with anything it hits.

  • Destructo Disc: Charges one’s ki into a disc of energy that can cut into opponents who are stronger than one’s regular Ki attacks can damage.

    • Death Saucer: Freeza’s own variant of the technique, which is more powerful and can be freely controlled by the user after being thrown.

  • Dodon Ray: Cell points one finger forward and fires a burning, piercing ray that can deal significant damage with little charge time.

  • Galick Gun: Another one of Vegeta’s signature techniques. After charging up enough energy, Cell thrusts his hands forwards to fire a purple energy wave that can annihilate planets.

    • He’s also capable of using the stronger Super Galick Gun, which as its name suggests, is the full power version of the above technique.

  • Kikōhō: Copied from Tien. Cell forms a diamond shaped gap between his hands, then draws upon his own life force to blast energy through it towards his foe.

  • Multi-Form: Cell creates a clone of himself with his own energy, before he and the clone split into two more clones each. While this normally has the drawback of splitting one’s power by four to achieve this, Cell is able to do so without any such hindrance.

  • Special Beam Cannon: One of Piccolo’s signature techniques. Cell puts two fingers up to his forehead, and after charging for a while, fires a spiraling beam that can drill through most targets. The strength of the technique varies depending on how much it’s charged, with the longest forms being able to hit above the user’s typical level of power.

  • Spirit Ball: Copied from Yamcha. This technique creates a small ball of energy in Cell’s hand, which he can control to dart around and build kinetic energy to strike his foe repeatedly, detonating with the final hit.

  • Spirit Bomb: By channeling energy from surrounding life forms and energy sources (such as planets directly), Cell can harness enormous amounts of energy into one attack, which directly affects those who aren’t pure of heart. While the user typically also has to be pure of heart to use it, to the point where Goku is portrayed as being unable to use it as a Super Saiyan due to the form’s natural aggression, Cell can use it in other media anyway because he’s simply built different.

  • Supernova: The attack Freeza used to destroy Planet Vegeta. Cell raises one finger up, charges up a giant sun-like ball of energy, and sends it flying towards the opponent. It can also be detonated by firing another Ki Blast into it.

Solar Kamehameha

Cell’s ultimate attack, being his own perfected form of the Kamehameha. Cell charges up a beam of energy that dwarfs his own body in size, and fires with enough power to annihilate not just the Earth itself, but the entire solar system. It clashed with Gohan’s Father-Son Kamehameha, and would’ve eventually overpowered it had Vegeta not broken Cell’s concentration.

Feats

Overall

  • Killed and absorbed hundreds of thousands of people, then used their power to easily best Piccolo

  • Successfully absorbed both Android 17 and 18 to reach his Perfect Form

  • Was strong enough to demolish Vegeta even after Hyperbolic Time Chamber training

  • One-shot Hercule Got a cheap shot at Mr. Satan, only beating him through ring-out

  • Held the advantage against Goku during their fight at the Cell Games, and reasonably would’ve won outright had Goku not forfeit

  • Beat Gohan down prior to his transformation

  • Killed Son Goku with his Self-Destruct and lived to get a power-up from it

  • Murdered Future Trunks with a Death Beam without even meaning to target him

  • Very nearly would’ve killed Gohan and destroyed the solar system had Vegeta not intervened

  • Has consistently been a top tier powerhouse in Dragon Ball FighterZ

  • Co-hosted a pretty neat DBX that one time

  • The record shows, he took the blows, and did it his way

Strength

Imperfect Cell

Semi-Perfect Cell

Perfect Cell

Super Perfect Cell

Speed

Imperfect Cell

Semi-Perfect Cell

Perfect Cell

Durability

Imperfect Cell

Semi-Perfect Cell

Perfect Cell

Super Perfect Cell


Scaling

Son Goku: Up to this point in Goku’s story, Cell had been the strongest opponent he’d ever gone up against, with Cell overwhelming him plenty throughout their fight and Goku admitting that he wouldn’t win if they kept fighting each other.


Vegeta: Upon initially reaching his Perfect form, Cell thoroughly dominated Super Vegeta after surviving his Final Flash, before later no-selling his Ki and one-shotting him as Super Perfect Cell.


Freeza: With his Ki being directly compared to Freeza and King Cold’s combined after first making his presence known, and him killing his own timeline’s Future Trunks who had already killed Freeza prior, Imperfect Cell is already leagues above Z’s Freeza, with the gap only becoming far wider with each transformation.


Piccolo: After absorbing enough people, Imperfect Cell was already at a point where he could easily dominate the recently fused Piccolo, completely overwhelming and very nearly killing him without much effort.


Miscellaneous: Anything else that can just be summed up with “Cell is the main villain of the Cell Saga and thus obviously upscales off every feat from weaker characters prior.”


Broly (Toei): While Toei Cell’s placement in comparison to LSSJ Broly is debatable, Broly’s best feats were performed while he was limited from his maximum power output, and could only transform into a regular Super Saiyan. As both Super Saiyan 2 Gohan and Super Perfect Cell are leagues above the cast that fought Broly in Toei’s canon, the anime’s Cell scaling to at least SSJ1 Broly is arguable.


Kid Buu (Toei): When Goku arrived in hell in GT, he encountered Freeza and Cell, who had both been training in the afterlife and were confident they could defeat him even after personally witnessing Goku defeat Buu in Toei’s canon. That said, it’s debatable how much said confidence correlates with their power scaling, as it could’ve come from their immortality in hell making the duo basically unkillable in such a fight.


Weaknesses

(well this stinks)

Along with the various techniques and powers Cell has acquired from his Saiyan adversaries, he also inherited a Saiyan’s desire for a good fight and to battle strong opponents. Cell has repeatedly not taken opportunities to kill his adversaries if he felt there was a chance for them to get stronger, with him even actively pushing Gohan to reach Super Saiyan 2 rather than attempting to simply kill him then and there. As Super Perfect Cell, however, he tends to be a lot more straightforward when it comes to killing his foes.


Additionally, while incredibly potent, his regeneration can be undone if his core is destroyed, which doesn’t necessarily require his complete vaporization to do so.


Super-Skrull

Background

  • Full name: Kl’rt

  • Height: 6’ / 1.83m

  • Weight: 625 lb / 283.5 kg

  • Groups: The Alliance, Galactic Council, Guardians of the Galaxy

  • Former emperor of the Skrull Empire

  • Had a robot girlfriend


As a member of the shapeshifting alien race known as the Skrulls, Kl’rt was one of their finest warriors. Being an essential member during the Battle of Harkoon, he was betrothed a wife from the planet Zaragz’na for his accomplishments and bore two children: his son Sarnogg and his daughter Jazinda. However, his devotion to the empire and the battlefield caused him to neglect time with his family. As a result of repeated failures stacking on top of each other, Kl’rt was disgraced and banished from Zaragz’na, and his wife left him with their children.


However, an opportunity for Kl’rt arose when scientists approached him with an offer: become the first ever Super Skrull and claim Earth for the empire. Eager to regain his honor, Kl’rt accepted, and was genetically modified to gain all the abilities of the Fantastic Four. With all this power at his fingertips, Kl’rt set off to kill the Fantastic Four and regain his honor. However, no matter how hard he tried, he kept on losing repeated battles against them, and was thus banished once again in disgrace. In his efforts of desperately trying to prove himself several times, Kl’rt was eventually trapped in hyperspace, unable to return to his homeworld and prevent its destruction from the hands…er, mouth, of Galactus.


After escaping his near eternal prison, Kl’rt became aware of the changes and tragedies that came upon his race, with them even losing the ability to shapeshift and the Kree using that as an opportunity to attack them. Kl’rt was outraged, and so worked, albeit reluctantly, with the Silver Surfer to help his people. With his help, the two eventually worked together with the current empress, S’Byll, to restore the abilities of the Skrull race and fight back against the Kree. Soon enough, the space pirate Captain Reptyl joined the fray on the side of the Skrulls. Kl’rt grew jealous of Reptyl’s closeness to S’Byll, whom he developed feelings for, and eventually challenged him to a duel, ending with Reptyl’s victory by ripping out Kl’rt’s throat. The Super Skrull was finally dead…


…but not really. Turns out he faked his death and was just in a coma to heal himself, all in benefit for S’Byll. After finally awakening and returning back to his homeworld, Kl’rt finally gained what he wanted: the praise and respect of his people. After so long, he once again proved himself a warrior for them, and had everything he wanted…but he couldn’t accept it. He couldn’t accept the idea that he had to purposefully fake defeat in order to gain what he wanted: it was a disgrace to his honor. In spite of his orders to stand down and pretend to be dead to certain parties, Kl’rt disobeyed his orders and flew to Reptyl’s ship, slaughtering him and his crew. As a consequence, Kl’rt was stripped from his rank and left again in disgrace.


Wanting to, once again, redeem himself in the eyes of his empire, Kl’rt went to Earth again and tried to conquer it several times to no avail. Growing tired of his repeated failures, Kl’rt decided to settle down on Earth as a new person, taking up the identity of Lon Zelig. However, Kl’rt made a shocking discovery during his time on Earth: his old enemy Captain Marvel bore a child, with a Skrull no less! This Skrull was Teddy Altman, also known as Hulkling. Realizing that Teddy could be the key to reuniting the Skrull Empire, Kl’rt sought to find Hulkling first and bring him to his people, at the unfortunate cost of killing his foster mother. Amidst the desperate battle, Kl’rt came to realize that Teddy belonged on Earth, and made the sacrifice of pretending to be Hulkling so that the young boy wouldn’t have to go.


However, his ruse was never discovered, as soon after, the Annihilation Wave was unleashed upon the galaxy, destroying planet after planet and instigating a full on war. Aware of the danger the Skrull Empire was in, Kl’rt opted to fight on behalf of his people and defend them, but kept on narrowly escaping with his life. He became desperate to stop the Wave, knowing all too well it would be a matter of time before they target Zaragz’na and destroy his son. Kl’rt left the empire in rage, entering the Negative Zone to destroy their weapon, the Harvester. Along the way, he led a resistance force against the Annihilation Wave and formed bonds, even falling in love with a robot named Praxagora. 


It was at this point that Kl’rt learned why he always failed in his fights against the Fantastic Four: they were a family. Everytime they fought, it was for one another. Their trust in each other is their true strength, and he never understood it until the life of his son was in danger. Unfortunately, despite all his efforts, Zaragz’na was destroyed, and his son along with it. Grief-stricken but determined for revenge, Kl’rt fought his way to the deepest parts of the Harvester alongside Praxagora before finally entering the core. Praxagora was prepared to self-destruct and take the weapon down with her, but Kl’rt refused to leave her. Not willing to see another loved one die again, Kl’rt confessed his love to her and absorbed her energy, sacrificing himself to destroy the Harvester in her place. In the end, Kl’rt finally did an action of good and was hailed a hero.


Kl’rt would eventually be revived and become a key member in defeating Annihilus and ending his rampage throughout the galaxy. Since then, Kl’rt has finally seen the side of good and has made actions to atone for his past sins. He helped free the Kree galaxy from the Phalanx and worked alongside the Galactic Council and Avengers to defend against the Builders. His journey from warrior to savior of the universe earned him the literal crowning moment of becoming emperor of the Skrull Empire, for a time at least, finally regaining his honor like he always wanted. In time, Kl’rt worked alongside others to end the age long conflict between the Kree and Skrulls and eventually joined the Guardians of the Galaxy, vowing to become a protector of the universe at all costs.

Experience and Skill

Being trained in the art of warfare by the Skrull military, Kl’rt was a skilled and capable fighter for the empire, even prior to his genetic modifications. He participated in the brutal Battle of Harkoon against the Kree Empire, being one of the head generals, and performed so well he was rewarded for his actions. He’s shown his capability in leadership in other situations, such as amassing and leading an entire resistance force against the Annihilation Wave and successfully executing a plan to destroy their greatest weapon. 


Despite having his powers for less time than the Fantastic Four, he’s arguably just as, if not more creative and skilled with his powers than either of them. Easy examples showcasing this would be removing the limbs of a person and cauterizing the stubs in a way designed to suffer, or turning his limbs into thin razors for easy cutting. Mans just built different.

Abilities

Shapeshifting

As befitting of a Skrull, Kl’rt has the ability to shapeshift to his heart's desire, whether it be into organic or inorganic matter. He often uses this ability to deceive others and uses this to his advantage by posing as a hero, with others unaware of his true appearance. However, Kl’rt can use this ability for combat as well, such as turning himself into a battering ram to, well, ram into his enemies. Kl’rt can even copy the abilities of whomever he mimics, such as Captain Hero’s intangibility or Iron Fist’s…well, Iron Fist.

Hypnosis

One of his more unique abilities, the Super Skrull can hypnotize enemies with just a glance. The extent of this ability can range from simply stunning an enemy for an opening to attack, forcing others to do actions against their will, or erase memories. He’s even capable of invoking hypnotism with just his laughter.

Fantastic Four Power Mimicry

After being genetically re-engineered by Skrull scientists, Kl’rt gained all the abilities of the Fantastic Four. Not only is he capable of mimicking their abilities to comparable, and even to superior degrees, but he gains extra tools and powers that the original members don’t possess, making him a wildly unpredictable foe.


While he originally required the aid of energy rays from his planet to use these abilities, repeated exposure to it over the years left these powers permanent to him, and he no longer requires the transmission beam to maintain these abilities.

Super-Strength

With the incredible might and stamina of The Thing, Kl’rt gains unbelievable supernatural strength. This has helped him contend with some of the finest warriors in his universe, such as Captain Marvel, Namor, Hulk, Thor, and more.

Pyrokinesis

With the powers of the Human Torch, Kl’rt gains the ability to…use fire. Big shock. While most of his abilities are relatively the same, they’re enhanced to be outright superior to what the Human Torch can do. He can turn his body into fire bright enough to blind a person, fly around and maintain his flaming body for prolonged periods of time, gain resistance to heat, mold weapons made out of fire, such as a war mace, a scythe, chains, and even a bow and arrow, and shoot flaming blasts hot enough to incinerate entire bodies.


Beyond just the basics, Kl’rt gains separate new abilities as well. He can fry the very air around someone until it turns into black carbon, preventing sight, and shoot plasma blasts of anti-matter. Most impressively, he can absorb large amounts of heat, even if it’s an infinite amount, though absorbing too much can prove to be fatal.

Invisibility

With the powers of Invisible Woman, Kl’rt can, of course, turn his body completely invisible. This allows him to remain undetected by most, leaving him free to beat up anyone unsuspecting of him. As an additional ability, Kl’rt can see anything invisible and get rid of something or someone's invisibility, revealing their location.

Psionic Force Fields

Kl’rt has access to Susan’s other ability, an invisible forcefield. Being as durable as the original, these force fields can hold off hits from even the mighty Mjolnir without breaking, though defense isn’t their only usage. Kl’rt can summon them on top of others to prevent them from moving, trap opponents inside a bubble, create constructs for uses such as sealing doors, or summon them inside someone's brain to crush it. All of these uses are limited only by his imagination, making them extremely versatile options.

Elongation

With the ability of Mr. Fantastic’s awesome stretching, Kl’rt can mold his entire body into elastic proportions for various uses. He can stretch for over 100 miles, enlarge his body, form a cage from his arms, flatten himself against an asteroid, turn his fist larger than a human body, extend his arm in combat for greater range, and rubberize his body to defend against various attacks.

Regeneration

While not shown much, Kl’rt has displayed a healing factor in certain instances. He’s used it to recover from injuries such as a hole in his chest or having half of his face blown off. Should a wound prove too fatal, Kl’rt can enter into a deep coma to heal himself, even if he gets his throat ripped out.

Resistance to transmutation

Whether it be his body or his armor, Kl’rt has been outfitted with a defense mechanism to protect him from transmutation.

Feats

Overall

  • Is one of the strongest Skrulls ever to exist

  • Won numerous battles during the Battle of Harkoon

  • Survived getting infected by cancer

  • Led a resistance force against the Annihilation Wave

  • Became emperor of the Skrull Empire

  • Helped bring an end to the Kree-Skrull war

  • Defeated the Fantastic Four, Captain Marvel, Tigra, Captain Reptyl, Namor, and She-Hulk

  • Doesn’t fall for a monologuing bait

Strength

Speed

Durability

Physical

With Shields

Scaling

Mr. Fantastic: Kl’rt has reacted to attacks from Reed and defeated him several times.


The Thing: Kl’rt is stated several times to have strength equal to, if not greater than Ben, and has matched him in combat.


Invisible Woman: Kl’rts force fields are directly stated to be equal to Sue’s.


Human Torch: Kl’rt has matched Johnny’s flames before and ran circles around him.


Namor: Kl’rt has held his own against the Sub-Mariner in a fight. Namor has also battled the Fantastic Four multiple times, who Kl’rt obviously scales to.


Thor: While not as consistent, Kl’rt has had a couple fights with Thor and performed well, being capable of damaging him, blocking strikes from Mjolnir with his forcefield, and reacting to Mjolnir.


The Hulk: Kl’rt has matched She-Hulk in combat, who has fought Hulk before and has shown to be comparable to him.

Weaknesses

In spite of all his might, the Super-Skrull is far from invincible. While he may have all the powers of the Fantastic Four, he can’t use them all at once. Using too many powers at the same time can gradually weaken his strength, so he’s constantly having to play catch up. Beyond that though, with all the powers of the Fantastic Four also comes many of their weaknesses. Powerful enough water or whirlwinds can completely snuff out his flaming powers and his shields can be outflanked.


Additionally, Kl’rt has no defenses against his own hypnotism, so should someone be able to reflect it back at him, he’s completely helpless. His regeneration also isn’t completely full proof, and a fatal enough blow will spell the end for him.

Summary

Cell

“I have proven that I am unstoppable. Neither you or your friends are any threat to me now. However, there is one that I want to test my complete power against. I want you to bring me Goku. This tournament is sure to be a guaranteed hit. Everyone will be watching me. I just can't wait to see that look of panic and fear.”

Advantages:

  • Solar Kamehameha outstats any direct feat or statement Kl’rt has

  • Superior regeneration, and will gradually get stronger with each regeneration through Zenkai

  • Better in hand to hand

  • Generally more versatile abilities

  • Much greater range and AoE

  • Ki sensing completely negates Skrull’s invisibility

  • Unlike his competition, actually succeeded in the revenge plot he was given powers for

  • Higher tier in FighterZ than Skrull ever has been in MvC3

Disadvantages:

  • Weaker than Skrull’s best scaling

  • Less useful abilities overall

  • Far less combat experience

  • Has no options around Kl’rt’s force fields

  • Up against an opponent that has options for destroying his core

  • Stuck in the Home for Infinite Losers

Super-Skrull

“You can choose to fight me on this rock...or join me and take your revenge on the sadistic sons of Sch'maags that put you here! So what is it going to be?”

Advantages:

  • Stronger and tougher with his highest end scaling

  • Far faster

  • Much more experienced

  • Generally more useful abilities

  • Force Fields heavily outstat regardless of any other factors

  • Regen and force fields ensure Cell would have a difficult time landing fatal blows…

  • Torch’s flames should make him immune to the Solar Flare

  • Capable of taking out Cell’s core, and thus bypassing his regeneration

  • Unlike his competition, ate out an android girl he wasn’t related to

  • Is an absolute beast in LEGO Marvel Super Heroes

Disadvantages:

  • …But his own regeneration isn’t anywhere near as potent as Cell’s

  • Worse in hand to hand combat

  • Abilities aren’t quite as varied

  • Far inferior range and AoE

  • Physically weaker than Cell with direct feats/statements and lower end scaling


Verdicts

Spider-Pidge

(“The nightmare is finally over… Thanks, everyone.”)


Lowkey kind of ironic that we’re starting with a Marvel character and I wasn’t even the one researching the comic boye.


Anywho, verdicts’ll be handled in a sorta unique way for this match. With two primary ways of examining Perfect Cell under a Death Battle context, and two verdicts between us, mine will be covering anything that applies to Cell within the canon Dragon Ball timeline, while Phantom’s will elaborate on what does and doesn’t change when looking at Toei’s Cell.


Even just purely looking at his canon incarnation though, Cell honestly has a fairly solid amount of advantages over Kl’rt here, with the most obvious being his regeneration. While both possess the ability to regenerate from damage, the kinds of wounds that required Skrull to go into a coma to heal from are well below Cell simply shrugging off his head being vaporized or his entire body self-destructing. And since he’s going to get Zenkais off of all of them, his power is simply going to increase the more he can survive Skrull’s attacks.


Beyond just his regen, Cell’s clearly a more skilled martial artist than what Kl’rt has managed in the past, and his wider array of techniques give him more versatile options for continuing the fight than Skrull does. And since the area and range of those attacks are as large as they are, and Cell’s ki sensing means that Skrull’s personal invisibility is basically useless, a lot of the bio-android’s options will be hell to avoid unless Kl’rt can actively react to and counteract against them.


…Which, to be fair, isn’t particularly hard for him given how massive the speed edge is. It’s not hard to see why any instance of Skrull moving interstellar distances is enough to sweep anything canon Dragon Ball has given around the Cell Saga, let alone Kl’rt being comparable to feats such as Reed intercepting the Ultimate Nullifier across similar distances (over 300 million times faster than light). Skrull has all the time in the world to counterattack with his own abilities, as well as open up Cell further with his hypnosis and mind control, which Cell generally lacks resistances to? Truthfully there aren’t a particularly high amount of telepathic abilities in Dragon Ball that could be used to gauge these resistances, and the closest example to such a counter (Majin Vegeta resisting Babidi’s control) was done by someone far stronger, both physically and mentally, over half a decade after Cell died.


Given these edges, along with his far greater experience on his side (Comparing someone who’s fought for decades and participated in warfare constantly VS someone who died at six years old does that), Skrull certainly has what it takes to win if he’s strong enough to put down Cell’s regeneration. At that rate, the main thing that would seem to determine the eventual winner would be raw power, and depending on how you look at things, one could theoretically argue that Cell could take that advantage.


The Solar Kamehameha is directly stated to be capable of wiping out the solar system, and has been nearly constantly supported in basically all surrounding media to be a legitimate claim. Comparatively, Skrull’s best statement is his ability to detonate stars, and a fair amount of the scaling he’d get from The Thing and Human Torch put him in the planetary-star range as well. And given that any significant damage that doesn’t kill Cell would boost his strength further, if one is less lenient with scaling Skrull to his fights with the likes of Thor, you could genuinely argue that Cell has the edge over what Kl’rt can physically pull off.


…Physically pull off.


Yeah, enough beating around the bush. Even if one were to try to argue that none of Skrull’s higher tier scaling would end up being consistent, and that Cell could end the battle by landing a single hit on Kl’rt, literally none of that would matter in the grand scheme of this debate. Cause you wanna see just how much one single ability could so decisively render one side’s advantages meaningless and swing a verdict towards their opposition? Look no further than Super-Skrull’s force fields, courtesy of the Invisible Woman.


What’s so special about a bunch of force fields you can’t see? Well…


They’re force fields that can block hits from Mjolnir repeatedly without damaging.


They’re force fields that Vision, who Ultron literally built to fight Thor, does not think he can break.


They’re force fields strong enough to shatter Doctor Doom’s armor.


They’re force fields that let Sue hold off an Incursion dropping directly on her.


Yeah uh, no real way to sugarcoat that; having shields that can block two universes collapsing onto each other, even for a short time, is more than enough to single-handedly give this win to Kl’rt even if you honestly think his physical strength doesn’t hold up.


For starters, Cell simply lacks any way of getting through it. None of his attacks have the ability to outright bypass one’s defenses, and the gap between solar system and “can hold off universal destruction for a time” is so wide that even stacking Zenkais onto each other are not getting any closer to breaking it. While Skrull’s shields have technically been outflanked before, since Kl’rt is far faster than anything Cell has, and his flames genuinely burn brighter than what Cell’s Solar Flare could affect him with, Cell lacks any means of breaking his concentration and Skrull will just react to all that he does, so none of his attacks will ever end up going through. Additionally, it also means that Cell couldn’t take a cheap shot with absorption to try to drain Skrull, leaving Cell without any means of dealing meaningful damage and, ironically giving Kl’rt higher survivability in spite of having the worse regeneration.


Offensively, the shields can be used to damage foes that are just as strong as the force fields themselves, as shown with Doom. Not only does this in itself give an attacking option for Skrull to use against Cell, but it’s completely in-character for him to just drop a few inside his foe’s body and crush what’s inside till they break. Skrull has the capabilities to destroy Cell’s core and end the fight instantly, and even going with Kakarot’s statement that the core isn’t in his head, it’s not hard to see Skrull being able to abuse his speed edge and simply crush every part of Cell back to back just to ensure he’s hitting the right spot.


Hell, he could just as easily just pull a Booster Gold and fully crush him to death from the offset, or trap Cell within a force field as he’s firing one of his own major attacks, letting it circle back and envelop him in his own energy beams till he’s vaporized. We know the latter would kill him, since the Father-Son Kamehameha that did kill him was something Cell had the power to actively match for an extended period of time, meaning that a strong enough redirected attack could put him down. And it’s unlikely for Cell to catch on in time that he shouldn’t use his strongest attacks in such a scenario, as said force fields are again, invisible, and lack anything resembling a ki signature that would allow Cell to track them.


Keep in mind that all of the above is written with the assumption that Super Perfect Cell is strong enough to overwhelm Super-Skrull’s physical power. If one’s more willing to consider Skrull’s battles with characters like Thor and She-Hulk for higher scaling than star detonation, or think that Ben’s scraps with the likes of Doom (Which, naturally, have happened a helluva lot) are enough to put the other heavy hitters in the First Family at a level comparable to or beyond Cell’s, then that simply pushes things further into Kl’rt’s court. Even at a theoretical power disadvantage, Super-Skrull’s far superior speed, decades of experience, and overwhelming force fields are enough to gift the bio-android a perfect death.


Gotta hand it to Cell though, he seemed to know where this match was going before it even started.


Cause I do think a barrier will work.


Phantom Falcon

(Art by genzoman)


Lowkey kind of ironic that we’re starting with a Dragon Ball character and I wasn’t even the one researching the bug boye.


Pidge already explained above how Kl’rt vs Manga Cell goes down, but that’s only one side of the coin to this matchup. Toeiverse exists, and Toeiverse Cell exists. How does that fare out?


For strength, there’s miscellaneous bit feats that exist before Cell Saga, like Planet Arlia’s destruction adding plenty of consistency for planet level even in the Saiyan Saga. The anime also still has the obvious solar system statement, but we can go a lot further than that. The Broly movies exist within the Toei timeline and take place before the Cell Games (given that Goku is uh, alive lol). In this movie, we see Broly’s infamous feat of destroying an entire galaxy. Remember, Broly had his power restrained by Paragus’ headband and only went LSSJ after meeting Goku, and Goku recognizes his ki as the one that destroyed South Galaxy in his regular Super Saiyan state. This means Broly performed this feat in just his regular Super Saiyan form


The biggest argument against this feat was it being overtime, due to the fact the narrator says the South Galaxy is being destroyed yet we still see it in the movie. However, the sub gives us a more accurate idea of what happened. Note that the narrator says the South Galaxy is under attack, not in the process of being destroyed. Keep in mind the South Galaxy isn’t actually a galaxy, but rather a quadrant of the mortal universe, alongside the North, East, and West Galaxies. The Daizenshuu clearly states this, while also saying galaxies exist within this quadrant. WIth this and the sub dialogue in mind, it’s more than likely Broly’s on screen feat is destroying one of the many galaxies that reside in this south quadrant.


It’s also unlikely that this feat of destroying just 1 galaxy is overtime too, because King Kai was watching and never commented on the feat until after the galaxy was destroyed. If it wasn’t super recent, I don’t think he’d suddenly comment on it in an urgent tone, and it’s not like he just now noticed a galaxy being gradually destroyed over years and never brought it to attention. With this, I feel fairly confident putting Broly in the galaxy level ranges, and given Super Perfect Cell managed to hold his own against SSJ2 Gohan and even broke his arm, who should logically be far above the Goku that defeated Broly, this would put Cell in the galaxy level ranges at the minimum.


It’s also possible to argue him higher. In Dragon Ball GT, Cell and Freeza battle GT Goku in Hell, and are fairly confident in being able to fight him, even after seeing him battle Kid Buu and hold his own. This is admittedly a little bit debatable, since I think it’s possible part of their confidence came from the fact that they’re virtually immortal in Hell, and thus Goku can’t really put them down. That said, they clearly got stronger, and even Goku commented on their increased power, so it’s decently plausible for a high end for him to be above Kid Buu. Kid Buu himself is stated to be the most powerful Buu in the anime, putting him above Buuhan’s feat of nearly destroying the entire spacetime continuum. Kid Buu himself has feats close to that level casually on his own for consistency, like threatening to destroy Grand Kai’s planet (which is smaller but still relative in size to Heaven, which is universe sized) and threatening to destroy the Kaioshin Realm, which is stated by the Daizenshuu to be 1/10th the size of the Macrocosm. So as a high end, Universal Cell has a good case to be made.


That was long, so thankfully speed is a bit easier. Even back in the Namek Saga, Goku could react to meteors up close that were moving at comparable speeds to his spaceship. This spaceship, at minimum, is over 200x faster than light due to being 5x faster than Kami’s spaceship, which traveled to Jupiter in under a minute. However, this is a criminal lowball, and the feat is actually much faster. Older maps of the Dragon Ball Macrocosm have depicted Namek and Earth being on near opposite ends of the mortal universe, and King Kai has said Namek is out of his jurisdiction (the North Galaxy), which would add support to the map. Assuming the distance is roughly half of the observable universe would put the spaceships speed, and thus the meteors speed, at nearly 3 trillion times the speed of light. Goku even managed to fire a Kamehameha beam at a sun’s surface before the ship can even reach it, which would add some extra consistency to it. By extrapolating some multipliers, it’s even possible to upscale Cell high enough to be quadrillions of times faster than light range.


To be blunt, yes, this is obviously higher than any of the low-end scaling one can give Skrull via his brawls with the Fantastic Four.


The low end scaling.


Yeah, surprise surprise, the First Family is probably a lot stronger than one might think. Ben has battled Ultron, with the latter even saying their raw strengths are likely equal. Ultron has proven time and time again to be a consistent match for Marvel heavy hitters, given his stronger bodies are, well, stronger than the one that Thor couldn’t even dent with all his might. This might seem inconsistent, but remember that Ben has gotten into multiple fights with Doctor Doom and performs pretty decently. He directly overpowers and breaks his arms through his armor and Reed was worried he’d end up killing Victor. Even against a future version of Doom, Ben sent him flying with a punch and beat his ass to the point Doom had to activate the armor’s self repair function.


This is pretty important because Doom himself is an important benchmark for scaling. The guy can survive multiple blows from Hulk with only a dent in his armor and make him bleed with a punch. Hulk has several impressive feats, most notable being the time he destroyed Nightcrawler’s universe with a single Thunderclap, or when he bloodied Hyperion with a punch, who survived the destruction of 2 entire universes unscathed. Hulk is roughly even with Thor, who has feats of crossing entire universes and travels to Asgard on a regular basis, both feats reaching quintillions of times faster than light, and two Thors can strike with enough force to rival the Big Bang.


This, combined with Kl’rt’s own scuffles with She-Hulk (who should be comparable to Hulk) and even holding his own against Thor, means he scales to these universe busting feats. Keep in mind the Mahvel universe has a stated size of at least 1 trillion light years in radius, making it 10 thousand times larger than the observable universe in volume. Dragon Ball’s macrocosm is pretty large, but even assuming that Buuhan’s feat was going to affect the entire structure would leave you with 3-15x universal. Even using Heaven as a high end benchmark for scaling the macrocosm would give you barely over a thousand times larger the observable universe, which is still below 1 Marvel universe in terms of volume. It’s really hard to spin the stat trinity in favor of Cell here.


At the end, we’re left with a Galaxy to at best a thousand times universal and trillions to possibly quadrillions times light speed Cell VS 10-20 thousand times universal and quintillions of times light speed Kl’rt. Even with max benefit of the doubt, a clear picture is painted here. This major stat advantage, alongside much better abilities and experience as elaborated by Pidge above me, means that the Super-Skrull has enough in his favor to gain a decisive victory.


Read Annihilation: Super-Skrull it’s really good.





Hi, Rina here

If you’re reading this, then I’m assuming you finished the blog. Thanks a ton for reading it. This blog has been a passion project in the works for half a year, and although some irl stuff hindered its progress, I’m glad it’s finally out. This match has been high in my most wanted for quite some time, and my love for it has only increased working on this. I plan to do some more blogs for other ideas I like at some point in the future, organized into some sort of “waves”, so look forward to the rest of wave 1.


Wanna give some special shout outs before closing this off though:


Huge thanks to Pidge, my best friend and collaborator on this. She was the one who brought up the idea of doing this in the first place, and it was a total blast being able to talk and look into a match we’ve spent countless hours talking over.


And special thanks to Twice and Kingsly for double checking this blog and giving advice. You two rock.


With all that, I’ll be signing off for a bit. Take care everyone


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